In South Korea, Yoon Suk Yeol, the president who was already immersed in scandal before martial law

SOUTH KOREA – A real fiasco, perhaps one too many. Times are troubled for South Korea, as its president, Yoon Suk Yeol, declared martial law on Tuesday, December 3… before backpedaling a few hours later. The conservative leader lost his standoff with Parliament which managed, at the last minute, to pass a resolution calling for the withdrawal of martial law. He is now threatened with dismissal and his Minister of Defense offered his resignation this morning of Wednesday December 4.

This maneuver by Yoon Suk Yeol was, according to him, to protect the country from threats emanating from North Korea and “ forces hostile to the State ». In reality this situation took place in a context of explosive parliamentary debate with the opposition on the vote on the 2025 budget.

His popularity, which was already at its lowest point before this episode, may not recover. It must be said that the character is already accustomed to scandals from which he has difficulty extricating himself.

A reputation very quickly tarnished

Yoon Suk Yeol was elected in 2022 with a reputation as a slayer of corruption. An aura acquired during his career as a prosecutor. He indeed played a key role in the impeachment in 2016, then the incarceration, of former President Park Geun-hye for abuse of power. Appointed attorney general of the country in 2019, he stood out again by indicting a close collaborator of President Moon Jae-in, his predecessor, for fraud and corruption.

As AFP points out, this is how he attracted the attention of the People's Power Party, despite his total lack of political experience; This is also how he won the party primaries, then the presidential election. An election won with the narrowest margin in the country's history against his great rival Lee Jae-myung, leader of the Democratic Party.

But his reputation was ultimately very quickly tainted by scandals, this failed attempt to establish martial law ultimately being just another (big) drop of water in a vase that was already overflowing.

A woman and a mother-in-law accused

From October 2022, he had to deal with the repercussions of the deadly Halloween stampede in Seoul. A tragic event which left more than 150 dead, attributed to a series of negligence on the part of the authorities.

On a more personal level, in 2023, the problems keep coming as his wife was filmed without his knowledge accepting a designer handbag worth $2,000, offered by a pastor. He actually apologized for it on television last November. He was also accused of abusing his right of veto, in particular to block a parliamentary investigation into a case of price manipulation involving his wife.

Also, her mother-in-law, Choi Eun-soon, is serving a one-year prison sentence for falsifying financial documents in a real estate transaction and is expected to be released in July.

A huge disappointment for the voters of the new president. “Those who voted for Yoon believed that a new government under his leadership would uphold values ​​such as principle, transparency and efficiency”declared to the BBC Don S Lee, Associate Professor of Public Administration at Sungkyunkwan University. Exit the aura of slayer of corruption, hello disillusionment.

Series of failures and failed acts

He had already had hiccups during his campaign in 2022. He had to reconsider his remarks according to which authoritarian President Chun Doo-hwan, who declared martial law and was responsible for the massacre of demonstrators in 1980, was “good at politics”. He also had to deny insulting the US Congress after meeting Joe Biden in New York.

A self-confessed anti-feminist, he pledged during his campaign to abolish the Ministry of Gender Equality, at the forefront of progress for South Korean women since 2001, but was never able to put this promise into practice. lack of parliamentary majority.

In power, he moved closer to Japan, attracting the discontent of part of the population in a country where resentment against the former colonial power remains strong. His critics have blamed his government for food price inflation, a flagging economy, and increasing limits on freedom of expression.

Finally, his formation, the People's Power Party (PPP, right), was largely defeated in April by the Democratic Party (center left), which placed this conservative president in a difficult position to implement his program during the three final years of his mandate.

And « besieged man », and « desperate gesture »

Moreover, Yoon Suk Yeol is criticized for abusing the vetoes he places on bills adopted by the opposition. He uses it on one “unprecedented frequency”declared to the BBC Celeste Arrington, director of the Institute of Korean Studies at George Washington University.

This is precisely what he would have wanted to do this week when the opposition reduced the budget proposed by the government. However, the draft budget cannot be vetoed. He therefore drew the ultimate weapon: martial law.

Pour Leif-Eric Easley, professor of international studies at Ewha Women's University in Seoul: “He looks like a politician under siege, making a desperate move against growing scandals, institutional obstruction and calls for impeachment, all of which are likely to intensify now. »

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